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Why UK collectors get a raw deal!

Hope Hasbro are reading...

1 - Severe lack of Star Wars figures / vehicles available.
2 - Only Toys R Us is a major retailer and hasn't stocked since Flashbacks.
3 - Limited releases of POTF figures.
4 - no POTJ in shops.
5 - Can only buy POTJ (not all figures) from Hasbro direct for about £8 ($12?).
6 - Can pay upto $15 - $20 for figures at Toy Fairs.
7 - High Price means can only buy one of each figure and don't open packaging.
8 - Above means army building and diaromas is difficult.

If I lived in the US I would stock up loads on armies etc. would also buy 2 of each enabling me to open one, and being a Student it doesnt help as limited cash....

It's all down to import. Hasbro UK don't import the stuff because for some reason there's a problem with the toys from America not passing the toy safety standards set by the official bodies in the UK. Therefore there is more of a trade coming through the grey market via Hasbro Germany who supply many of the smaller UK traders indirectly. Woolworths will not be selling star wars in any great quantity because they got burned on the ep1 fiasco. TRU will start selling only as a film tie in and then once the demand dies down will stop selling again. The only option left is to befriend a local trader and try to work out some kind of deal. Not the ideal situation but it worked for me and I have managed to build quite a few armies and get duplicates of many POTJ figures. You won't get anything by demanding but slowly slowly catchy monkey as they used to say in certain quarters.
Good deals are to be found in many online stores who do their best to import stuff the fans want. And then sell it at reasonable rates. If all us UK folk would get together in a thread here like the collectors of the US seem to manage to quite simply. We could pass on details of just found items and prices etc. so that we can share the treasure. How much did you pay for your TIE interceptor dukes? Want to know where I got mine for just £30? As opposed to one deal I saw selling them at £45. That's a significant saving that I could have passed on to you if we UK collectors had the cohesion that the US collectors do.

I have a feeling you are barking up the wrong tree, dukes, by addressing your concerns to Hasbro. You should be more upset at the retailers in your area, since if they don't order the product in the first place Hasbro cannot ship it to them. Hasbro would love to ship product to every store in the world as it means more potential sales; but they can't ship product to a store that doesn't want it.

"To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence… When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." - C.S. Lewis